In the wake of Black Friday uncertainty still surrounds online poker

It’s been nearly two weeks since poker players around the world awoke to messages from the FBI and Department of Justice at PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker, and Absolute Poker stating they had seized the domain names of the three largest online poker rooms serving the US market, and despite many pieces falling into place casualties are still being spotted in the wake of the devastation of online poker’s Black Friday.

The first piece of collateral damage was Victory Poker, whose CEO Dan Fleyshman asked the Cake Poker Network to bar US poker players from the Victory Poker tables. Now it seems three other online poker sites are following Victory Poker into self-imposed exile from the US poker market, as word is leaking out today that Sportsbook Poker, PlayersOnly Poker, and SuperBook Poker are all planning on disallowing NEW US poker players after May 1^st.

While far from official, several online poker forums and blogs have been hinting at Sportsbook and co. decision to stop accepting new US online poker players, likely stemming from the fact that all three sites are serious players in the online sports-betting market, which is expressly prohibited under US law.

The three sites all reside on the Merge Gaming network, but the decision will have little to no impact at all on the network itself, since current US players will still be able to play, deposit and cash-out according to the rumors. Furthermore, the sites in question will still be accepting new players from others parts of the world.

Since Black Friday, the Merge Gaming Network has seen the largest overall increase in traffic, with a nearly 65% increase week-over-week according to the latest reports from www.pokerscout.com. The traffic increase has brought the Merge Gaming Network close to being a Top 10 online Poker Room/network; a standing that will likely only increase more as US players start to return to the market.

While there has no official word from any of the involved parties, as we’ve seen in recent months… Poker news is usually broken on the forums, and I have personally heard from a very reliable source that this is just about a done deal. So if you are a current player at Sportsbook Poker, PlayersOnly Poker, or SuperBook Poker you can still play at these sites, however anyone from the United States will be barred from joining these three online poker rooms after May 1^st, 2011.